Worsening air pollution in London is leading some to wear face masks. ‘Today’s campaigning calls for action will eventually become a consensus.’ Photograph: Jill Mead for the Guardian

A problem that cannot be seen is one that politicians will generally choose to ignore. That natural human tendency is dangerously short-sighted. When it comes to air pollution it is literally lethal. Scientists and environmental campaigners have been warning about a build-up of toxins in the atmosphere over British cities for years. Yet only when the filth forms a visible haze, when people are advised to stay indoors because outdoor respiration is palpably harming their health, does the issue register on many political radars.

The smogs of the early 1950s were unignorable, not just because they could be seen but because they were obvious killers. Thousands died when an especially noxious cloud settled over the capital in 1952. The resulting Clean Air Act tackled domestic and industrial coal-burning. Hundreds of thousands are directly affected by equivalent scourges today – particulate emissions, nitrous and sulphurous compounds, mostly belched from cars. Children and the elderly are most at risk; minority ethnic and deprived communities are harder hit; but no one is immune. Parts of London reached the annual legal limit for volumes of nitrogen dioxide within the first five days of 2017. Glasgow, Leeds and other cities are similarly blighted. Almost two-thirds of the population backs an upgrade of clean air legislation.

This week the European commission issued a “final warning” over the UK’s failure to meet anti-pollution standards. The court of justice in Luxembourg could impose hefty fines for non-compliance. Inevitably, some Eurosceptic ultras see this as a problem of jurisdiction not public health, as if the problem goes away when the court’s reach into UK affairs is curtailed after Brexit. Nigel Farage has blamed British air contamination on dirt wafting over from Germany – an assertion as stupid as it is ethically negligent.

Emissions are the problem, not the European institution enforcing a standard to which the UK has submitted voluntarily and with good reason. Pollution affects the poorest most, but it harms us all. The air we breathe is an indivisible shared resource that can only be protected by collective action.

That upsets those conservatives who hate the idea of government acting on behalf of society as a whole in ways that curtail any individual freedom – even the freedom to pollute. But the facts can overcome even the most stubborn denial. Today’s campaigning calls for action will eventually become a consensus. London’s mayor Sadiq Khan is in the political vanguard. His calls for a Treasury scheme to encourage the upgrading of old diesel vehicles to cleaner models has obvious merits. So do ultra-low emission zone regulations in town centres and positive incentives, such as cheaper parking, for electric vehicles. But those are tactical measures when the challenge is strategic – a policy shift towards clean, public transport that works well enough to make individual car journeys less essential.

None of this will happen without a commitment from government to cleaner air, underpinned by statute, including targets that trigger sanctions in the breach. The European commission might soon lose the authority to rebuke Britain for allowing our air to be foul, but the duty and power to clean it up has always been a matter for Westminster. The moment to take that responsibility more seriously is long overdue.